Tencent's first-half profit surges 66 percent

Tencent's first-half profit surges 66 percent

HONG KONG, Aug. 11 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Mainland leading internetcompany, Tencent, earned 3.7 billion yuan in the first half of thisyear, a surge of 66 percent from a year earlier, on increasingadvertising sales and rising number of users for its socialnetworking services, said Tencent in a statement to the Hong Kongstock exchange on Wednesday.

Tencent announced the unaudited consolidated results for thesecond quarter and the first half of 2010 ended June 30.

Revenues increased by 65.3 percent to 8,895.2 million yuan forthe first half of 2010 from 5,382.8 million yuan for the first halfof 2009.

The company will not give an interim dividend.

Profit for the second quarter of 2010 increased by 60.7 percentto 1,931.2 million yuan from 1,201.7 million yuan for the secondquarter of 2009.

Looking into the third quarter of 2010, Tencent expect on-linegames within Internet value-added services (IVAS) business tobenefit from positive seasonality due to summer school holidays.However, the year-on-year growth rate of the overall IVAS businessis expected to slow down compared to the previous year as it alreadyhas reached a relatively larger revenue base.

Tencent shares fell 4 percent in Hong Kong to 148.70 HK dollarsbefore the earnings were announced.